Film notes written by Steve Massa and Ben Model
for the film series "Cruel and Unusual Comedy: Social Commentary in the American Slapstick Film", presented at the Museum of Modern Art (NYC) since 2009 and currently running in its 5th series in January 2017.
This site is created independently by Steve Massa and Ben Model, and is not affiliated with the MoMA Department of Film.

"Cruel and Unusual Comedy"...on the air on NPR

Elif Rongen-Kaynakci and Steve Massa were guests on the Leonard Lopate Radio Program on March 16, 2012.

Listen here:

Saturday, January 7, 2017

Ever since the "Cruel and Unusual Comedy" series began in 2009, Steve Massa has written independent film notes which have been posted on this site for filmgoers and fans. This time, for the current mammoth 84-film series running January 13-26, 2017, Ben Model and Steve Massa have instead created film notes in a different format.

Three separate podcasts, films notes in conversational form, are posted here as special episodes of Ben's current on-going Silent Film Music Podcast. Chapter breaks have been built into each episode and, if your podcast player accomodates them, you will be able to navigate to a specific program if you wish to. If your player does not support this feature, timings for each chapter are listed below.

Film Notes Podcast episode 1

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00:00 welcome; intro to special "Cruel and Unusual Comedy" series and podcasts
06:33 Plots and Plotters
15:00 Chaplinitis
27:08 Sports Injuries
37:04 Arts Deprectiation

Film Notes Podcast episode 2

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00:00 welcome; intro to special "Cruel and Unusual Comedy" series and podcasts
04:31 Westward Whoa
14:36 Love and War: Romantic Skirmishes
26:16 Family Jewels: Child Progeny
34:29 Wage Slaves and Working Stiffs
40:00 Slapstick Hash

Film Notes Podcast episode 3

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00:00 Welcome, and intro to Cruel and Unusual Comedy
04:02 More Plots and Plotters
11:21 Ethnic Profiling: Stereotypically Speaking
19:47 Loco Motives: On the Wrong Track
27:52 Scared Silent
36:27 Hits of the Past
45:29 Working Girls